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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23372782">Matelotage</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard/pseuds/TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard'>TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stray Kids (Band)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe, Canon-Typical Violence, Feelings Realization, Fluff, M/M, Pirates, Romance</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-03-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 13:13:22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,932</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23372782</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard/pseuds/TheSwingbyJeanHonoreFragonard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Fighting means so much more when you're doing it for a reason.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Lee Felix/Lee Minho | Lee Know</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>162</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Matelotage</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>Minho loves to watch Felix fight.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The man is aggressive despite his slight frame and small height. He is small enough and quick enough to practically dance around men twice his size and then cut them down before his opponent can retaliate. His weapon of choice, a curved scimitar stolen from an eastern palace, has such a distinctive shape that all the blade has to do is catch the light of the sun to send rival pirates fleeing, screaming.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Elazul</span>
  </em>
  <span>, they call him. It means ‘of blue’ in the old language. It means ‘of death.’</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But no matter how sharp Felix is when he is fighting or drinking or looting, he will always be soft for Minho.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And Minho, despite his own need to stay prickly and fierce when surrounded by forty other gruff, angry pirates on a galleon in the middle of the ocean, will always be soft for Felix.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Neither man will call it love. Not yet. Not out loud.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Not when there is so much at stake.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Not when they are so, so close to parting ways.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It is day six of their journey. The winds were kind to them and they only lost half a day to dead sails. Even the ocean showed her kindness and gifted them low waves and gentle tides. Captain Bang had stocked up expecting a full month out on the water yet they had made such a journey in a quarter of the time. The crew’s only worry was that they were running low on rum and that was the best kind of worry to have. Their destination is but another day south. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>An island. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The isle is rumored to be cursed, but curses mean nothing to a pirate when jewels are to be had.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho leans his elbows on the stern railing of the upper deck and sighs into the wind. It is coming from the wrong direction, he realizes, and they will lose valuable time attempting to fight it to stay on course. He closes his eyes and wishes for the direction to change and then he keeps his eyes closed because it feels good.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It is a strong wind. Cool despite the time of year. The wind billows and blows through Minho’s loose linen shirt and sends the colorful ribbons he’s tied about his waist fluttering.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He opens his eyes. They wouldn’t get this kind of weather in the dark, gloomy waters of the northern islands. He can almost </span>
  <em>
    <span>feel</span>
  </em>
  <span> how southwest they are.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The hour is early. The morning is quiet. The upper deck is empty.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho enjoys the moment of peace and solitude while he can, as rare as such peace can be when in close quarters with men who always need to fight or sing or yell.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho tries to control the direction his thoughts sail but they keep running aground on Felix.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix is the newest member of their crew. It hasn’t quite been two months. Once a stowaway, a thief who stole a bag of the captain’s gold and nearly lost his hand for the trouble, Felix proved himself in a duel, helped the crew fight off pirate hunters sent by the king, and then swore his loyalty to Captain Bang.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>His story couldn’t be any more different from Minho’s own, who had simply asked to be part of the crew and was brought aboard.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For Felix, it has been weeks.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>For Minho, it has nearly been a year. And he has seen many a man come and go. They step onboard full of wicked ambition and greed. They step off missing arms, missing legs, missing eyes, missing pieces of their shattered minds.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But Minho is going to be different. When he steps off in a week’s time, he will only be rich.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Yet Felix… Felix definitely might make Minho stay. And that is a dangerously high amount of power for one man to have.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>There’s just something about Felix.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Not even the captain is entirely certain where Felix is from but the bronze of his skin and the dark freckles that dot his face narrow down his origins either to the tropical archipelago beyond the whirlpools far to the south or to the sandstone cities of the western deserts.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix’s hair is black and shaggy and long and, by some unspoken rule over the past two months, it has become Minho’s job to maintain it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The boat always creaks on the water, even when she is anchored. She sings a chorus of old wood and flapping sails and taut ropes, but Minho can distinguish the noise of the deck weighed down by footsteps and he turns to see the very man he is thinking of.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What am I to do with you,” Minho whispers affectionately as Felix approaches.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“My hair’s come undone in my sleep,” Felix explains himself. As if he needs a reason to come close. The sun is just beginning to rise, painting the horizon in sunflower yellow and mango orange. Some of that light catches in Felix’s eyes as he smiles sheepishly. He runs a hand through his loose, messy hair.  “Can you do it up for me again?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Aye,” Minho responds. With his back to the railing, he sinks down to sit on the deck. He gestures Felix forward with a flick of his hand and watches as the man crosses the deck towards him, risking splinters or insect bites by being barefoot. Minho can’t help but smirk up at him. There’s no way </span>
  <em>
    <span>his</span>
  </em>
  <span> handiwork comes undone in less than a day. He knows Felix undoes the braid himself, if only to ask Minho to do it again. If only to spend even more time with him. “Lie down,” Minho gently commands, stretching out his legs.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix sits across from him instead, as if to show some modicum of restraint before flinging himself across Minho’s lap. “How long have you been awake?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho glances up at the sky and makes a judgment based on how far the stars have moved. “An hour.” And he can tell that it won’t be but an hour more before Captain Bang is shouting for the anchor to be raised and the sails to be set. Minho looks back down and Felix is staring him full in the face, eyes curious, teeth biting back a grin.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Clearly the man wants to say something, but for all the bravery he shows wielding his sword, he possesses none of it when he is empty-handed.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho attempts to make it easier for him. “Something on your mind?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix almost startles, as if the last thing he expected was for Minho to give him the opening. Yet he doesn’t take it. He lowers his gaze to the space between them. He sits there, stiff, while the wind plays with his hair and fumbles with the black silk scarf with gold embroidery Felix keeps looped around his neck despite the weather.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix looks troubled and all Minho wants to do is lift a hand and brush that foul expression from his face. It does not belong. “What do you want to ask, </span>
  <em>
    <span>elzulo</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Not ‘of blue.’ Not ‘of death.’ But ‘of ocean.’ Of beauty and wonder and mystery.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The slight alteration to his nickname makes Felix look up at him. It makes a streak of pink rise to the top of his cheeks. At last, Felix finds his courage. He asks, “Did you sleep well?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Aye,” Minho responds.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No more nightmares?” Felix does not mean to poke fun.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho nods. “Aye. None.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>His nightmares plagued him the entire journey. They were the main reason he was so ready to step ashore and leave life on the ship behind.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>His mind supplies him with horrible images at night. Half of them are wretched memories, like the port towns they razed to the ground, the pirates they killed and dumped overboard for the sharks. Half of them are frightening images of his own making, the ship sinking as rival pirates swarm the deck and steal the cargo, the many-tentacled monster that lurks in the black waters of the open sea.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When his lack of sleep began affecting his duties, the situation was brought up with the quartermaster and, of course, to the captain. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Three days ago, Captain Bang had suggested liquor right before bed. And that may have made Minho sleep like the dead through the night but it brought head pain and stomach aches in the morning, an awful combination on the rolling deck of a ship at sea.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Two nights ago, Jeongin had handed Minho a tincture he had made from snake venom, rare jungle fruit and witch hair. Jeongin dabbled in voodoo, the strange boy, and he claimed his concoction would fight back the sleep terrors but it kept Minho from falling asleep at all, leaving him feverish and tossing and turning throughout the entire night.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>One night ago, Felix had stepped forward with his own solution. The simplest of all. The most effective of all.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They merely shared a bed. And it worked.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho didn’t have nightmares. He only dreamed of pleasant things. Warmth and stability. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“That is good to hear,” Felix says. His shoulders slump in relief, as if it would have truly pained him to know that he had failed at this.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I only wish you had come up with the idea sooner,” says Minho. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I was afraid to suggest it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You? Afraid?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Yes,” says Felix. And the admission embarasses him. He chokes out a laugh. “I can be afraid too.” Even with his infamous sword slung at his hip.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho admires his duality. It reminds him that, beneath the ferocity of a pirate, is the common simplicity of a man. A </span>
  <em>
    <span>human</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho relaxes. He leans his head back against the ship’s railing. The wind picks up and his own short hair irritates him as the wet locks slap against his neck and cheeks. He frees a ribbon tied around his waist. It is green like kiwi fruit on one end but it blends into the blue of tropical ocean waves on the other end. He bought it nearly a month ago. The amatuer work of a novice seamstress. It is beautiful in its own way. With it, he tightly ties his hair out of his face and away from his neck.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho meets Felix’s eye. “I apologize for making you wake up alone. You should know by now that I never miss a sunrise.” </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And that part is true. The one person to be out of the cabins and up on deck even before Captain Bang could only be Minho.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Perhaps it is because he is the ship’s navigator and the minutes before dawn are the best time to chart the stars and gauge the wind and double-check the maps.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It is alright,” says Felix. His own hair slings one way and then the other around his head much like the black flag at the top of the ship’s center mast flaps one way and then the other.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The wind swirls, howls, and then blows in a far more favorable direction.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Their journey forward will be smooth now. Their luck will change.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho gestures towards Felix again and this time the man obediently crawls towards him and lies on his back so that he may put his head across Minho’s lap. The warmth of his body spreads through Minho’s thighs and brings to his attention how cold he’s been out here. Minho uses a finger to brush Felix’s hair away from his deep brown eyes. He says, “I pray my nightmares didn’t jump from my head to yours during the night.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I slept fine,” Felix admits. “Better than I ever have. Believe me.” Perhaps it is because they are so close and because it is so quiet but Minho can </span>
  <em>
    <span>feel</span>
  </em>
  <span> Felix relax. Minho can feel how deeply comfortable Felix is with him. His toes uncurl. His fists unclench. He stares up at Minho with a look of utter trust and devotion on his face, as if he’ll take a cup of rum or poison from Minho and down either one with equal abandon. “And thank the sun and seas that your nightmares stopped.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho cards his fingers through Felix’s hair. To gently detangle the knots, he tells himself, but really it is just an excuse to touch Felix. To trace the shell of his ear. To run a knuckle beneath his chin and along his jaw. To cradle the back of his head. “Felix, why do you insist on keeping your hair so long,” he asks. A ship isn’t exactly the safest place for long hair. Days of abuse from the harsh sun and the sea-salt winds turns hair dry and stringy. The high number of ropes and pulleys and chains onboard turns hair into a hazard in the heat of a battle. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“It is the one thing that ties me to you,” Felix says. “Without it, I have no reason to seek you out in the mornings.” Felix taught Minho how to use milk from coconuts to keep his long hair soft and strong. It was Minho’s own talent with knots that gave him the idea to place Felix’s tresses in intricately detailed braids. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Your hair isn’t the only reason I’d want to see you,” Minho tells him. “And I would certainly hope my braiding skills aren’t the only reason you’d want to see me.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“No,” says Felix quickly. He lifts a hand and curls his fingers around Minho’s wrist. Not to stop him but… just to hold him. Just to touch him. Already, he is dropping his hand back to his side. “There are thousands… No, there are a million reasons why I want to see you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And his words are bold. Brazen. They hint at so much more and Minho is surprised by how eager of such possibility he is. He longs to discover each and every one of those million reasons. Minho asks, “How did you know that sleeping next to me would fix me when neither alcohol nor medicine could?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“When you were in the throes of your night terrors,” Felix tells him, his voice a song beautiful enough to rival sirens, “you would always reach out as if begging to be held.” He does not break eye contact with Minho when he adds, “So I held you.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho feels his entire being smash onto the rocks of Felix’s smile. He feels the ship of his heart take on water. He sinks and sinks and sinks, further into Felix.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Further into his ocean. Further into his blue.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“And I will keep holding you,” Felix adds. “As long as you need me to.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho’s hand slips to his waist a second time. He undoes the knot of one of the multicolored ribbons tied about his hips. He picks one based on feel. Based on texture. Then he lifts it up enough for it to catch the light of the rising sun. Enough for the wind to tug at one corner. Ahhh. It is one of his newer ones. He traded for it with a merchant in the last port town they had visited before aiming for the southern waters. This ribbon is pink striped with white and threaded through with yellow. The colors of spring. Minho will braid it into Felix’s hair and loop the end around itself six glorious times so the ribbon will mirror the appearance of a flower in bloom. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Minho’s face must also bloom with delight at the idea because a smile slowly pulls at Felix’s lips as he watches the man work. “Minho, what am I to do with you?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And they are Minho’s own words tossed back at him, wrapped in the same easy-going fondness. “Whatever you like, I suppose,” says Minho with a chuckle. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They’ll sail the ocean, finish their journey, brave the curse of the forgotten island, and collect their rubies. Then Minho will step onto dry land for good. He will go home. Or, rather, he will go to see if there is a home still left waiting for him. He will go where there are no nightmares.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>But Felix has other plans for the two of them. “Then how about I swear my everything to you,” he calmly, lightly suggests. As if none of this were more serious than an invitation to breakfast. “How about we bind ourselves to each other like the ocean binds itself to the sky?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>A union.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>How fitting.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And the proposal feels so natural. Minho hardly breaks the rhythm of his braiding to agree. “Aye, Felix. I will carve us matching rings, I’ll braid a binding-rope and tie our hearts together and if either of us dies, Captain Bang will be sure our earned treasure and plunder stays with the survivor.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Felix laughs. Pure joy. “Sounds like you’ve thought this through.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>And Minho realizes that he </span>
  <em>
    <span>has</span>
  </em>
  <span> thought it through. Not just an hour ago, waking up with Felix’s arms around his middle, but earlier than that. A month ago, perhaps? The third or fourth time he put a braid in Felix’s hair and the first time he used one of his precious ribbons in the design. With a sigh, he says, “You behave in ways that always have me planning for this.” And maybe Minho hasn’t been looking for a reason to go ashore after all these months. Perhaps he’s been searching for a reason to stay.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>So when Felix sits up off of Minho’s lap and presses their mouths together, all saltwater and sea wind, Minho finds that reason.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He stays.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>
  <a href="https://curiouscat.me/TheSwingbyJHF">cc</a>
</p></blockquote></div></div>
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